Art Workers' Guild

The Art Workers Guild was born from a specific act of professional rebellion. In 1883, the Royal Academy of Arts relegated architecture and the decorative arts to side walls in a minor gallery, treating them as subservient to painting and sculpture. In response, a group of frustrated young architects and designers from the office of Richard Norman Shaw organized a new society to assert the dignity of all creative labor. They met under the shadow of the nearby Saint Georges Church to formalize their belief that there should be no divide between fine art and craftsmanship.